"I don't think anyone would expect that an initial meeting like this where people said what they had to say would deescalate or defuse the tension," Boucher

WASHINGTON, April 27 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – After winding up talks in Beijing with Chinese and North Korean negotiators, the U.S. is now seen as a poker player sizing up an opponent's hand. It should now separate bluff from reality as it weighs its next move against reluctant North Korea.

Talks in Beijing between U.S., Chinese and North Korean negotiators last week did little to lower temperatures in the six-month-old nuclear crisis -- to no one's surprise, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said.

"I don't think anyone would expect that an initial meeting like this where people said what they had to say would deescalate or defuse the tension," said State Department spokesman Richard Boucher.

But the talks, which featured tough talking on both sides, leave President George W. Bush at a policy crossroads.

He can either seek further and broadened diplomatic contact with Pyongyang or conclude it will never cede its nuclear programs and try to isolate and “punish” the Stalinist state, possibly through United Nations sanctions.

Complicating the choice is the fact that Washington is unsure whether Pyongyang's grand claims for its nuclear program are grounded in fact or are merely a negotiating tactic.

Few were surprised by North Korea's confirmation in Beijing that it has nuclear weapons.

But experts here are analyzing North Korean delegate Li Gun's reported claims to U.S. envoy James Kelly that his country may demonstrate its nuclear capacity, and his apparent remarks that Pyongyang was reprocessing 8,000 fuel spent rods which could produce more nuclear weapons.

The Beijing talks produced nothing that will convince the Bush administration to ditch its firm stance on the crisis.

"We're not horse trading for an end to nuclear weapons programs, we made that clear from the start," said one senior U.S. official on condition of anonymity.

But those who think engagement should be given a chance believe that the Bush administration should now flesh out for Pyongyang the idea of a "bold approach" it was prepared to offer, before it discovered a highly enriched uranium (HEU) nuclear weapons program in North Korea last year.

"It seems to me there still is room for having a conversation which goes beyond the United States saying 'you must return to the status-quo ante' before we will talk to you further about anything," said Alan Romberg, a former senior State Department official now at the Henry L. Stimson center.

"Lay it out in some more detail than the U.S. has been willing to do but to make it clear that the first step in the process before the U.S. does anything, and without compensation, the North does in fact dismantle whatever (HEU) program it has."

To do that, the administration would have to climb down from its insistence that it will not submit to what Bush again referred to on Thursday as "blackmail."

That is "very unlikely," said Derek Mitchell of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, as it would set a bad post-Iraq war precedent for other aspiring nuclear powers.

It would say "if you don't have nuclear weapons you get attacked and regime change. If you do get nuclear weapons then we will run scared to you and make a deal."

An alternative approach, favored by so-called hawks in the U.S. administration, would be to punish, and isolate Pyongyang, hoping for the collapse of Kim Jong-Il's regime.

For them "the best way to proceed now is to have international condemnation, sanctions, quarantine and isolation to make sure they are squeezed economically and prevent them proliferating what they might develop," said Mitchell.

But the weak link in that strategy -- essentially a bid to force regime change in Pyongyang -- is that it would require the cooperation of China.

Beijing has no interest in seeing a collapse of North Korea, fearing a tidal wave of refugees and the prospect of a U.S.-allied Korea dominated by Seoul at its borders.

Therefore, many analysts believe China will be increasingly active on the diplomatic front, trying to bind Washington into a long-term dialogue.

"Fair And Equal Footing"

Meanwhile, North Korea on Sunday called for a fair and equal footing in talks with the United States over its nuclear program, insisting the Stalinist country could do "everything" to defend itself.

The North's ruling Workers Party newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, blasted Washington for insisting that there would be "no security of the system nor provision of rewards" even if Pyongyang gave up its nuclear program.

Rodong said North Korea "will be left with no option but to do everything to defend itself unless the U.S. legally guarantees no use of arms including nukes."

"If this poses a threat to the U.S., the latter should take a corresponding measure for a solution to it," it said.

Washington should "sincerely approach the settlement of the issue on a fair and equal footing," Rodong said, adding Pyongyang "does not intend to wrest a concession" from Washington.

The daily warned the nuclear crisis would not be resolved easily if the United States insisted "on its viewpoint that it never makes a concession because it is a big power."

"The U.S. statement that there will be no provision of rewards even after the settlement of the 'nuclear issue' is, in essence, little short of opposing the conclusion of a non-aggression treaty between the two countries," it said.

A North Korean foreign ministry spokesman said Friday that Washington avoided essential issues in response to a "bold" proposal from Pyongyang to resolve the crisis in talks in Beijing.